Synopsys halts semiconductor software exports to the public in line with Trump policy
Synopsys, a semiconductor design software company, has stopped selling and accepting new orders in China in accordance with the Donald Trump administration’s policy, Reuters reported on the 30th (local time), citing internal documents.
The New York Times (NYT) and others previously reported that the Trump administration appeared to have banned the export of popular software from the three major semiconductor design software companies Synopsys, Cadence, and Siemens, but the specific circumstances have not been confirmed.
According to Reuters, Synopsys received a formal letter from the U.S. Department of Commerce’s Bureau of Industry and Security (BIS) the day before, informing it of new export restrictions related to China. Synopsys subsequently withdrew its annual and quarterly earnings outlook.
SK Square Bet on US Semiconductor Materials Startup
According to the investment banking (IB) industry on the 28th, TGC Square, an overseas investment corporation of SK Square, recently participated in the ‘Series C Extension Round’ of the American startup Numart Technologies.
Founded in 2012, Numart Technologies is a company that produces special materials using porous structures (MOFs). MOFs are used to selectively absorb specific molecules in the air or gas, or to precisely release them when needed. This technology is expected to create synergy with SK Hynix, a major subsidiary of SK Square.
Japan proposes to purchase 9 trillion won worth of US semiconductors as a tariff negotiation card
It has been reported that the Japanese government has proposed to the US during tariff negotiations that it would import up to 1 trillion yen (approximately 9.5 trillion won) worth of US semiconductor products. The Japanese government is also considering providing subsidies from the national treasury to encourage Japanese IT and telecommunications companies that operate data centers to purchase them.
This proposal is being used as a card to reduce the trade deficit with the U.S. of about 10 trillion yen, while also increasing Japan’s negotiating power in tariff negotiations between the two countries.
Samsung, Exynos ‘confident’… First to be installed in foldable phone
According to industry sources on the 27th, Samsung Electronics will apply the Exynos 2500, an AP designed by the System LSI Division, to the domestic version of the Galaxy Z Flip 7. Qualcomm’s Snapdragon 8 Elite will be used for the Z Flip 7 to be released in other regions, including North America. The Galaxy Z Fold 7, which will be released together with the Z Flip 7, will be equipped with Qualcomm chips.
The Exynos AP is designed by Samsung Electronics’ System LSI Division and manufactured by the Foundry (semiconductor consignment manufacturing) division. The latest AP, Exynos 2500, is produced using the 3 nanometer (㎚; 1㎚ = 1 billionth of a meter) process, which is the most advanced line of Samsung Electronics’ Foundry Division. This chip was developed with the goal of being equipped with the Galaxy S25 series released early this year, but it was ultimately not applied.
Xperix, Xplus, ID and Furiosa AI jointly invest
Digital identity verification specialist Xperix announced on the 30th that it will jointly participate in the Series C bridge round of AI semiconductor fabless venture company Furiosa AI along with its major affiliates Xplus and Intellectual Discovery.
Furiosa AI has been raising funds for mass production and global market expansion of its second-generation AI semiconductor, Renegade, and the round is expected to be completed soon. This joint investment is interpreted as a strategic move to build a strong AI ecosystem by combining the expertise of each company, rather than simply a financial investment.
“NVIDIA Blackwell ‘lag’ flaw fixed… speeds up production”
The Financial Times (FT) reported on the 27th (local time), citing multiple anonymous sources, that Nvidia partners such as Foxconn, Inventec, Dell, and Wistron have made progress in resolving the issue and have begun delivering Blackwell AI servers.
Partners including Foxconn announced at the recent Computex 2025 information technology (IT) exhibition held in Taiwan that they started delivering GB200 racks at the end of the first quarter and are rapidly increasing production volumes.
Racks used in data centers are structures that safely store and connect essential equipment such as chips and cables. The GB200 rack consists of 36 ‘Grace’ central processing units (CPUs) and 72 Blackwell graphic processing units (GPUs).
China DeepSeek Unveils New Cost-Effective Inference Model… “High-Performance Implementation with a Single GPU”
According to foreign media outlets such as TechCrunch on the 30th, DeepSeek released ‘DeepSeek-R1-0528-Q13-8B’, which has reduced the parameter size of its representative AI model ‘R1’.
This model is an inference model with 8 billion parameters, and was developed by fine-tuning the QONE3 model released by Alibaba this month with self-generated synthetic pre-learning data and an advanced inference algorithm.
In particular, DeepSeek-R1-0528-Qone3-8B has the advantage of having much less computing operations than the general model. While Alibaba’s Qone model requires a large number of NVIDIA H100 graphics processing units (GPUs) to operate, the newly released DeepSeek model is said to operate even in a single GPU environment.
LS Materials, Korea’s first ESS dedicated to electric vehicle charging stations
LS Materials announced on the 29th that it has developed the first hybrid energy storage system (H-ESS) in Korea exclusively for electric vehicle charging stations.
The H-ESS jointly developed by LS Materials and LS Cable & System is a product that can solve limitations such as power overload, fire risk, and infrastructure construction costs of electric vehicle charging stations. Existing ESSs have the disadvantages of rapid heat generation and performance degradation when repeated rapid charging and discharging, and short lifespan, making them highly dangerous and expensive to operate when used at electric vehicle charging stations.
An official from LS Materials explained, “By combining a capacitor specialized for high-speed charging and discharging with a lithium-ion battery, we were able to reliably charge multiple vehicles even during peak charging times,” and “By miniaturizing the ESS, we were able to reduce the installation area and cost compared to before.”
Almec Signs 190 Billion Won Parts Supply Contract with US Automaker
Almec, a company specializing in electric vehicle aluminum parts, announced on the 30th that it had signed a 190 billion won parts supply contract with a global American automaker.
The contracted quantity is scheduled to be delivered over a period of five years, from early next year to 2030. The order amount is based on the current scheduled quantity and may change in the future.
Almek explained that by securing orders from American automakers despite the U.S. tariff policy, the company was able to gain recognition for its technological prowess at its U.S. factories and secure growth momentum in overseas markets.
China dominates 80% of lithium battery separator market… Korea and Japan stagnate in performance
A survey found that Chinese companies accounted for more than 80% of lithium secondary battery separator shipments last year. According to market research firm SNE Research on the 30th, the demand and shipment volume for lithium secondary battery separators in 2024 will be 23.2 billion m2 and 30.2 billion m2, respectively. These figures represent a 30% and 22% increase, respectively, compared to the previous year.
The reasons for the shipments exceeding the demand are customers’ preemptive stock securing, operation of overcapacity production lines, and competition to expand market share. However, the increase in shipments did not lead to an increase in actual sales due to the electric vehicle chasm. As a result, the profitability of many membrane companies deteriorated.
POSCO, Core Resources Research Institute in Australia… Spurring Steel and Battery Technology Development
On the 30th, POSCO Holdings announced that it held an opening ceremony for the Australian Core Resources Research Institute in Perth, Western Australia.
This research institute will be in charge of developing low-carbon steel fuel and raw material utilization technologies and related technologies to achieve economical production processes while reducing carbon dioxide emissions during the production process. It will also serve as a hub for core mineral research and development, such as developing cost-saving technologies for lithium and nickel, which are secondary battery raw materials that are the future growth engines of the POSCO Group, and conducting projects in cooperation with local raw material companies and research institutes in major business areas.
In addition, we plan to conduct research on the rare earth supply chain and high-efficiency separation and purification technology in parallel to examine the possibility of new next-generation core mineral businesses and discover investment opportunities such as excellent global mines through information exchange with local authorities.
Battery-petrochemical demand slump continues… SK Innovation CEO suddenly replaced
SK Innovation announced on the 28th that it has appointed Jang Yong-ho, president of SK Corporation, as the new CEO. President Jang will concurrently serve as the CEO of SK Corporation and the CEO of SK Innovation. Choo Hyung-wook, president of SK Innovation E&S, has been appointed as the new CEO. Park Sang-gyu, who has been leading SK Innovation, has stepped down from his position.
This is the second time since the SK Supex Pursuit Council Chairman Choi Chang-won took office that the heads of SK Group’s key affiliates have been replaced in the same year. In June of last year, SK Square CEO Park Sung-ha resigned.
LG Ensol wins battery patent lawsuit against China’s Sunwada in Germany
According to Tulip Innovation, a Hungarian patent management company (NPE) representing LG Energy Solution, on the 29th, the Munich District Court in Germany ruled in Tulip’s favor in the company’s application for an injunction to prohibit the sale of batteries against Sunwada on the 22nd.
The court ruled that Sunwada had infringed on two of LG Energy Solution’s separator technologies and banned the sale of Sunwada batteries using the relevant technologies in Germany. It also ordered Sunwada to recall and dispose of its remaining batteries and pay damages to Tulip.
POSCO FutureM Completes Development of LMR Cathode Material for ‘Next-Generation Battery’
POSCO Future M announced on the 27th that it has completed the development of LMR (lithium manganese rich) cathode material, which will be a ‘game changer’ in the entry and standard electric vehicle market, and is moving to secure mass production technology.
LMR batteries are rapidly emerging as next-generation batteries as they are competitive in price with LFP batteries, which are mainly produced by Chinese battery companies, while having superior performance.
LMR batteries can significantly reduce the use of expensive cobalt and nickel and increase the use of inexpensive manganese, thereby increasing price competitiveness. Considering that LFP batteries are difficult to recycle, LMR batteries with a high lithium recovery rate can also have an advantage in economic efficiency, explained POSCO Future M.
Renault Korea and Intelligent Automobile Parts Promotion Agency jointly develop autonomous driving and ADAS
Renault Korea announced on the 28th that it signed a second business agreement with the Korea Intelligent Automobile Parts Promotion Institute (KIAPI) for joint development of autonomous driving and advanced driver assistance systems (ADAS). The two parties plan to strengthen mutual cooperation in research personnel, equipment, and resources for Renault Korea’s future mid- to long-term projects.
Through this, we will jointly carry out more than 10 ADAS projects in the future and also conduct various vehicle driving performance tests.
Namuga Unveils Next-Generation Intelligent 3D LiDAR Sensor ‘Stella-2’
NamuGa announced on the 30th that it unveiled the next-generation 3D lidar sensor ‘Stella-2’ at the ‘Embedded Vision Summit’ held in California, USA from the 20th to the 22nd.
According to the company, Stella-2 is a high-performance lidar sensor that combines LCM (Light Control Metasurface), a proprietary technology of Lumotive, a U.S.-based light control semiconductor company, and Namuga’s precision optical module design and high-difficulty mass production technology. Namuga led the core development of this product, from sensor module design to overall system integration, and provided the foundation for the product’s completeness.
Tesla Launches Robo-Taxi Service… Autonomous Vehicle Sales Era Begins
On the 28th, Bloomberg News reported that Tesla will start a robo-taxi service in Austin, Texas, USA as early as the 12th of next month. Currently, Waymo, a subsidiary of Google, and Baidu of China are operating robo-taxi businesses. Tesla’s robo-taxi business is different from Waymo and Baidu in that drivers can drive self-driving cars as personal cars and use them as taxis when not in use.
It will likely take some time for Musk’s vision to become a reality due to current government regulations. However, considering the speed of Tesla’s vehicle distribution and autonomous driving technology, it is expected that robo-taxis will become popular quickly.
Sapien Semiconductor signs 4.1 billion won supply contract with Japanese company
Sapien Semiconductor announced on the 27th that it signed a 4.1 billion won contract with a Japanese company to develop complementary metal-oxide semiconductor (CMOS) backplanes.
The contract amount is 52% of recent sales. The contract period is from April 30 to September 30, 2026. Disclosure of the specific contract partner has been reserved at the request of the client.
Hana Technology succeeds in mass production of UTG processing ‘hot-sanding’ equipment
Hana Technology, a company specializing in automation equipment for secondary battery and display processes, announced on the 30th that it has succeeded in mass producing ‘heat chamfering’ equipment for processing ultra-thin glass (UTG).
According to the company, on the 27th, Hana Technology completed the installation of thermal quenching equipment at the Aachen, Germany manufacturing line in cooperation with OLEDWorks, a global OLED lighting specialist in the U.S., and entered mass production.
The hot-cutting equipment being supplied this time is a device that uses high heat to precisely expand and contract the edges of ultra-thin glass and cut them. This is the first time it has been applied to a mass production line in the global market.
Solus Advanced Materials Enters the Market for New OLED Luminescent Material ‘Green Phosphor Host’
Solus Advanced Materials announced on the 28th that its new light-emitting (organic material) material ‘Green Phosphor Host (ph. Green Host)’ from its Organic Light-Emitting Diode (OLED) Business Division has successfully entered the domestic market.
Solus Advanced Materials explained, “After many years of research and development, Green Phosphorescent Host, which has its own IP with differentiated characteristics, has finally received customer approval and is entering the preparation stage for mass production.”
The background of the development of the green phosphor host by Solus Advanced Materials is the green fluorescence that was introduced during the previous Doosan Electronics era. At that time, the company had been applying green fluorescence products to domestic customers’ mobile products since 2011, and based on this, it developed a green phosphor with even more advanced performance, which received high evaluations compared to other companies.
Source: Kipost.net